“A genius with impossible ideals living in
impossible circumstances” is how John Carswell
describes Gaudier-Brzeska. In 1912, the volatile young Frenchman was scraping a
living as a shipping clerk, bound to a woman who was mentally unstable and twice
his age, and creating
sculptures of pure genius. He had no doubt of his powers:
“I
understand beauty in a way that was better than the Greeks, and history and
observation convince me that I am right.”

When Gaudier and his ‘platonic
lover’ Sophie Brzeska met the editors of
Rhythm, the two couples were charmed. Gaudier admiringly fondled Murry’s ‘godlike head’.

Further meetings ensued, but when
Gaudier suggested Sophie come to live in the Tigers’
cherished ‘wedding
house’ in Runcton, Katherine demurred. When Sophie opened up to Katherine the
sordid truth of her mental strife, she recoiled.

Gaudier visited the cottage and
heard Katherine speaking her mind about
Sophie through an open window. He left unseen, a bitter enemy. Gaudier wrote to Murry
denouncing the Tigers and all they stood for. He visited the offices of
Rhythm
demanding payment for a contribution and later, in a ceremony of brick-throwing,
he and Horace Brodzky smashed a plaster cast of Murry’s godlike head.

“My dear Murry,

I was confirmed
into my thought of the wickedness of Katherine Mansfield by a conversation I
overheard when at Runcton. It was about my poor Zosik [Sophie] … I loved you
innerly and still sympathise with you as a poor boy, chased by the Furies, but I
must reproach you your lack of courage, discrimination and honour…”

The impossible, idealistic
Gaudier-Brzeska died in the
trenches at
Neuville St. Vaast
on
5 June1915. He was twenty-three.